Across Japan, recent decades have seen a surge in the number of seniors living alone, with the issue of isolation further compounded by the pandemic. Goto Manabu operates a video chat service that connects seniors in need of meaningful interaction with foreign users eager to learn about Japanese language, culture and customs. And as well as promoting cross-border, cross-generational communication, the service also connects Japanese speakers with domestic firms in search of international talent.
"RISING"
"Connecting the World through Japanese"
Learning Platform Founder - Goto Manabu
65-year-old Shoji Hiroyuki
has a part of the day to which he always looks forward.
He's here?
Here you are at last, my lord!
Forgive me, for the app was slow to load.
You are here safely now, my lord.
Shoji, who lives alone,
is an avid user of a video chat service
that connects Japanese seniors with international learners of the Japanese language.
His partner today is Turkey-based Reha Avci.
Inspired by a childhood love of anime,
he's been studying Japanese for 11 years.
His current fascination is Japan's late-medieval warring states period.
I see the Sanada clan flag fluttering behind you.
Yes, there's a slight breeze.
It looks great!
In his youth, Shoji's interest in other cultures
even saw him attend university in the UK.
But ever since then, he has enjoyed only limited opportunities
to meet people from outside Japan.
That changed a year ago when he found this service,
making conversations with people from around the world
a part of his daily routine.
Normally it's hard to make friends from overseas,
but this service lets you go beyond mere introductions and do just that.
That's the most fun part.
The city of Kashiwa, Chiba Prefecture.
The chat service is run from this shared co-working space...
led by CEO and Founder, Goto Manabu.
I would feel a bit pretentious if I was dressed up in a proper suit.
We're not that kind of business,
so I think a casual vibe suits us better.
With many of the firm's 20 or so staff based in different regions of Japan,
most day-to-day meetings are conducted online.
Their service caters to a core demographic
combining Japanese seniors and overseas-based language learners.
Hello there.
Once matched with a conversational partner, each session lasts 25 minutes.
I'm from Indonesia. Good to meet you.
Good to meet you.
Of the 9,000 or so registered Japanese users,
some 70 percent are over 65,
and these retirees provide their time for free.
They are joined by some 20,000 language learners
in 158 countries and regions worldwide
who pay up to around 10 US dollars a month for unlimited access.
And for such overseas users,
it's the perfect platform to practice Japanese.
I ate breakfast at 7 a.m.
- Good evening.
- Good evening.
Good to see you again.
Thanks in advance for today.
In three years of using the service,
Tanaka Masako has enjoyed conversations with over 200 fellow users.
Today's counterpart is Taiwan-based Luo Miao-ju,
a weekly conversational partner for Tanaka.
Today, I did two pretty silly things.
What did you do?
On my way home from work, I decided to get a bento.
But just as I was ordering, I remembered I'd forgotten my purse!
Luo began studying Japanese after a trip to the country 10 years ago,
and since meeting Tanaka via the chat service,
her interest in Japanese culture has grown even stronger.
Every time we talk,
she teaches me so much about Japanese culture.
And I think that, if possible, after I retire,
I'd like to live in Japan even if only for a little while
and learn "Kamakura-bori" carving
and traditional "urushi" lacquer-work.
Through 45 years of marriage,
Tanaka and her husband raised two sons.
Look at this.
Even after our sons left home, the two of us kept up family customs.
Like throwing beans for "Setsubun."
And here he is, wearing an "oni" mask. I took this picture.
But, 13 years ago, husband Ryoji was diagnosed
with untreatable late-stage cancer.
He passed away at home six months later.
And ever since, Masako has lived alone.
With no supermarket or other shops nearby,
she gets most of her daily essentials delivered.
Against the backdrop of an aging society,
the number of elderly Japanese
who live alone has doubled in the last 20 years.
And with opportunities for outside social interaction
further hampered by the ongoing pandemic,
many seniors are finding themselves increasingly isolated.
My friends and I feel the social pressure.
They used to drop by when they were out for a walk,
and I'd walk back with them afterwards.
That doesn't happen anymore.
It does make me feel lonely sometimes.
Yes, it does.
But now, thanks to the online chat service,
she has lots of people to talk to in the form of users overseas.
Now I have friends in Taiwan, I wonder if I could travel there.
That's a kind of hope, or perhaps a dream that I've found lately.
You could definitely do that!
But please exercise every day!
- For fitness.
- Right, fitness.
I go for walks every morning.
With some light aerobics afterwards?
When I'm talking to people from Taiwan
and they tell me where they live,
these give me a sense of whereabouts that is.
And besides Taiwan,
Tanaka's interest in the backgrounds of other users
extends to in-depth research of their countries too.
Speaking to people from countries you have no ties to
and getting to know them,
you see the good in each other
and develop an affinity.
And you start to look out for what's going on in their country.
I think those kinds of connections are very important,
and they make me happy.
Using the service has also prompted Tanaka to take on new challenges...
like this computer course.
Today, she's learning how to make a calendar.
I want to make something that I can send to my grandchildren
or to other friends as a year-end gift.
That's my goal.
In all, the chat service has had a transformative impact
on Tanaka's everyday life.
For me,
it's like enjoyment and learning all mixed together.
And it's made me want to learn new things
and try taking on new challenges.
And with reluctance to go out due to the pandemic
adversely impacting the health of many seniors,
some local governments like Fujisawa, Kanagawa Prefecture
have introduced Goto's service as a countermeasure.
Here they've been promoting the service for the last two years
via tools such as local newsletters.
The initiative has been led by local civil servant Ishida Daisuke.
A big topic these days is "social frailty"
in which seniors may be physically healthy and mentally alert,
but they lack social connections.
That can have significant negative impacts on health,
or rather, mental health.
And it's scientifically proven how feeling useful
or connected to others
are key drivers of the motivation to live an active life.
So, through this initiative,
we're trying to provide those things to local seniors.
Ishida is joined by representatives of Goto's firm
for an event at this local community center.
The limited-numbers gathering
is a meet-and-greet for local users of the chat service.
All those assembled have been enjoying the opportunity
for online cultural exchange with learners overseas.
As of next month, I'll have been using the service for a year.
I've done 1,400 sessions so far, and my target is 2,000.
I did eight sessions yesterday!
- In one day?
- Yep, four hours.
I just do one a day.
And attendees soon get down
to discussing their experiences of the service.
I always brush up on basic greetings in my partner's language.
Like "hello," "thanks," and "goodbye."
If I learn those, I can use them at the start and the end of the chat.
- It's a good icebreaker.
- It closes the distance.
And through events like this,
the chat service is building real-world connections as well as virtual ones.
It's great to feel some human warmth.
I'm so glad of events like this.
A chance for a chat and a nibble.
Before founding this company,
CEO Goto Manabu had taken up a graduate position with a major IT firm.
But he left after only a year to focus on his own business plan
at this local co-working space.
Here's where I used to sit before starting the business.
Right here.
I'd quit my job after only a year and had no business model, no clue.
I'd sit here with all these books, just chewing my pencil.
Every day was like that.
Here's where it all started.
Here's my mom and I.
Goto was raised by his single mother, Sakura.
My mom's a pretty unusual person.
Like a female version of the Joker.
She's pretty full-on.
I suppose all photographers are weird.
In her early 20s, she went to the US alone
to photograph circus performers.
Thinking back, that was pretty proactive of her.
And because his mother's work as a photographer frequently took her overseas,
Goto was left in the care of his grandparents.
I did feel lonely back then.
My dad wasn't around,
and my mom was working overseas.
And being different to all my friends
did give me kind of an inferiority complex.
As a college student,
he followed in his mother's footsteps by studying overseas.
And after graduation,
he followed this up with a one-year backpacking tour
of some 30 countries around the world.
Meeting all these people from different backgrounds
and realizing how much we had in common
was really quite a liberating experience for me.
One particularly impactful encounter came while studying in the US.
In America, I was interested in the civil rights movement.
Martin Luther King, Rosa Parks and so on.
And I met this white woman in her 80s
who'd lived through all that in the American south.
Hearing the history through her eyes about how her own perception changed
and learning about that past through the filter of her life
made me feel almost like I'd been there myself,
and that was a very meaningful and profound experience.
And it was that realization of how much there was to learn
from the rich experience of the older generation
that gave Goto the inspiration for his present service.
But not all overseas users treat language learning
and cultural exchange as a hobby.
These young people in Myanmar
are studying with the aim of finding work in Japan.
Instructor Than Toe Aung has been using the online chat service for a year.
I think meeting and talking with Japanese people is a great way to learn.
I write down things I'm not sure about,
and I often ask them for clarification.
I've learned a lot that way.
And Than Toe Aung is another regular conversational partner of Shoji Hiroyuki.
Relax, don't look so serious.
This is my normal face!
Is everybody well over there?
In fact, Than Toe Aung has been using the service
to enlist Shoji's help with teaching his students.
Shoji has been helping them prepare for the Japanese Language Proficiency Test,
which will have a big influence on their chances of finding work in Japan.
They say people who drink more coffee get fewer blemishes on their skin.
Do you understand "blemish"?
No, we don't.
It means a dark spot.
A dark spot?
Just a moment. I'll draw a picture.
Here we go.
It's not a mole, it's a blemish.
These black spots are blemishes.
Got it?
Yes, we got it.
Shoji has been giving them 50 minutes of instruction
every day for the past four months.
We're not Japanese, so there's a lot we don't understand,
pronunciation and so on.
Shoji-san is very kind
and he teaches us all sorts of things.
It's been a big help to the students.
And their Japanese is really improving.
They're all working so hard
under difficult circumstances to come and work in Japan.
When I see that, I want to help them out.
That's how I feel.
But it's not just about me teaching them.
How can I put it?
They've inspired me to make an effort in the same way as they are doing.
Ah, there we go.
- Thanks for today.
- Thank you.
Another of Shoji's regular chat partners is Chang Chia-hsuan.
A pharmacist at a hospital in Taipei,
she too dreams of working in Japan.
Dietary supplements and so on that are developed in Japan
have found a big fanbase in Taiwan.
So I think it would be really great
if I was able to experience working in pharmaceuticals in Japan.
I think that would be fantastic.
And recently Goto has launched a new service
aimed at helping such overseas learners find work in Japan.
The initiative aims to connect Japanese learners
with domestic firms searching for overseas talent.
This service aims to help our learners achieve their dreams in Japan.
It's called "Sewa-Katsu."
Designed to provide full support around visas and accommodation
as well as work placements,
the service takes its name from the Japanese word "sewa"
which here means "look after."
Until now, we'd focused on exchange,
but more and more overseas users told us
that in the future they'd like to work in Japan.
We started to think that we'd like to create a service to help them do that,
and we realized that offering a recruitment support service
was the most obvious way.
So that's what we decided to start with.
And the new service has already begun
to connect Japanese companies with overseas learners.
Good evening.
Taiwan-based pharmacist Chang has already secured interviews
with two Japanese firms.
And two days ahead of her first online interview,
staff from Goto's service are helping her prepare.
I have a question.
Should I introduce myself as soon as I enter the virtual meeting room?
I suppose that is something to think about in an online interview.
I think that introducing yourself will help to make a good impression.
The day of the first interview arrives.
It's with a pharmaceutical ingredient manufacturer.
What score would you give yourself out of 100 for your career to date?
Maybe 90?
To help me plan the way forward, I make a point of self-reflection.
And constantly set goals.
Thanks to the advance preparation,
Chang makes it through the one-hour interview.
Thank you for your time today.
And a month after her second interview,
she receives some welcome news.
So, one firm got in touch to say they'd like to offer you the job.
Congratulations.
She is set to receive a concrete job offer from one of the companies.
Yay!
It marks the scheme's first successful placement.
And Chang soon takes to the chat service to share the good news...
Firstly, I have something to tell you.
with none other than Shoji Hiroyuki.
I received a job offer in Japan.
Congratulations!
Thank you so much.
He really gave his all to help me when I asked for advice about the interviews.
But he said "You'll be absolutely fine."
He's such a warm person.
And by facilitating communication between users in Japan and overseas,
Goto Manabu's service is continuing to connect the world through Japanese.
It's about humanity.
To us, that's the basis of communication.
And within that, there is great value,
yet more humanity, warmth and consideration.
There are difficulties too,
but ultimately I'm someone who was helped by such exchanges,
and we aim to help more and more people.
To me, that's our job.